"What happens in Vegas"... Will likely end up on this site. Sorry, Las Vegas Chamber.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

None

Last I checked, we're now over halfway through 2013. I'm sure for some of us here, the 2012 Election has become a rather distant memory. Yet today, we were given a reminder of that fiercely fought cycle.

A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that voters in Nevada will continue to have the right to choose none-of-the-above on their ballot. A 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel rejected a Republican-backed lawsuit that claimed the "none of these candidates" ballot option was unconstitutional. "The district court's ruling is a triumph for the voters of Nevada," said Secretary of State Ross Miller. "Voters who want to express their dissatisfaction with the federal and statewide candidates on the ballot should have the option and freedom to do it."

The Nevada Republican Party actually filed this suit last year in hopes of striking down a nefarious villain of Mitt Romney. No really, that's what they believed. I wonder if they've yet noticed the ironic twist of fate Ralston caught yesterday.

The lawsuit was filed a year ago to erase None of the Above is that it was filed by delusional Republicans who believed Mitt Romney had a chance to win Nevada and they needed to prevent those not thrilled with him from having a place to discard their vote. Forget that there were plenty of third-party options happy to accept a protest ballot. Suddenly, longtime Republicans such as ex-Clark County Commissioner Bruce Woodbury had epiphanies that somehow the option disenfranchised voters. It was complete nonsense with a pathetically obvious political motivation.

The irony, though, is that Republicans may have needed None of the Above to save Sen. Dean Heller, who won his race by only 12,000 votes over Rep. Shelley Berkley. In that contest, None of the Above took 45,000 votes. Maybe a third-party candidate, who received 49,000 votes (most of them surely protests against both contenders) would have taken all of those None of the Above ballots if it wasn’t available. But I doubt it. If the GOP had won the suit, Romney still would have lost decisively and Heller might be out of a job.

Do Nevada Republicans actually want to continue pursuing this law suit? Have they thought of the consequences of taking this choice away from Nevada voters? Oh, and how does "None of These Candidates" disenfranchise anyone?

Or are they still unable to process any of this... Because they still haven't accepted the results of the last election?